Fiddler on the Rooftop
by PsychoChick
Summary: Sequel to Cat on a Hot Tin Rooftop. Someone has been kidnapping a lot of Tokyo's children. When Weiss is chosen to stop the kidnapper, they must team up with people from Aya's past.


Fiddler on the Rooftop PsychoChick 

Fiddler on the Rooftop   
PsychoChick   
  


  
Disclaimer: Weiss Kreuz is not mine, and neither is Crashers. I'm making no money from this.   
  
Note: Another title with a stretch. *shrugs*   
Note2: I'm placing the entire rooftop series between 21-22. So, yes Aya-chan is missing.   
Note3: And yes, I know Birman gives them their directions around this time(I think....), so, using my hesitation, I'll stick with Manx....I know *her.*   
  
~"Television"~   
  
  
  
In a far away land, that still manages to be Right There, a high lord of the realm sits, watching his scrying mirror, that, with a trick of the light, seems to be broadcasting a television program.   
  
~"This is Ema Hasa, with the evening report. In the latest report on the missing children, three more have disappeared, and two have turned up dead. Police are stumped over who-- or what-- could be causing the children to vanish, from right under their parents very noses. Special detectives have been--"~   
  
In a far away land, that still manages to be Right There, a high lord of the realm sits, and a very quiet, very dangerous voice speaks.   
  
"My toys seem to have attracted attention. That will not do. That will not do at all."   
  
***   
Tsukiyono Omi blinked in confusion when he saw the parade of young men enter the Koneko before the redheaded woman he knew as Manx.   
  
"Mission time, Weiss," she said, holding up a disk.   
  
Omi nodded slightly, confusion still wrinkling his brow, as he put away the order he had been working on, watching the four silent and impassive men file past him.   
  
Throwing one last look behind his back at the basement door, Omi went to roust the others from their varying hiding places.   
  
"Aya-kun, Ken-kun, Yoji-kun!" he called down the hallway of their upstairs apartment.   
  
"Yoji's on the roof, and Ken is in his room," Aya told Omi from the couch.   
  
The blue-eyed boy smiled. "Well, Manx is here. And she brought people with her."   
  
Omi went to Ken's door, before Aya could say anything, knocking softly, before he entered, to find the soccer player reading a book.   
  
"Manx is here," the boy said, at Ken's questioning glance.   
  
Ken made a face. "Fun. Did you get the others?"   
  
"Aya. Not Yoji."   
  
"I'll grab him," the brunette offered. "You go on."   
  
Omi shook his head. "She brought people. I think we should go as a group."   
  
"What, gang up on them?" Ken grinned. "You're mean."   
  
Omi blushed, and Ken laughed. "Okay, we'll both go kidnap Yoji."   
  
***   
Kudou Yoji, oblivious to the commotion below him, was enjoying a quiet moment watching the clouds. He hadn't smoked a cigarette in a little over an hour, something he felt he should be proud of. He was just dozing off when he heard the roof door open.   
  
"Oi, Yoji," came Ken's voice. "Manx is here."   
  
Sighing in frustration, Yoji sat up. "Tell her I'm dead."   
  
"No can do, Yoji. Omi says she has people with her."   
  
Raking a hand through his hair, Yoji got to his feet.   
  
"Oh, goody."   
  
***   
By the time his teammates appeared in the living room, Aya was getting a nervous tick. He wanted to know what had taken them so long. He wanted to know why Manx had brought strangers, and above all, he wanted to know who they were.   
  
"Yo, Aya," Yoji smirked as they headed down the basement stairs. "Breathe. You'll find out soon enough."   
  
"Shi ne," the redhead hissed.   
  
"Why, Ran," came a smooth voice. "Do you still utter that phrase? You'd think people would get used to it, the way you bandy it about."   
  
Aya froze, and Omi frowned at the tone of voice the speaker was affecting.   
  
"Keep moving," Ken hissed, pushing at Aya, who shrugged off the hand and stepped properly into the room, glaring at the man who had spoken.   
  
"And you are?" Yoji asked, raising an eyebrow.   
  
"Weiss," Manx interrupted, stepping between the two groups. "Meet Crashers."   
  
Omi stepped forward with a slight smile, but the only one of the four young men who would look at him was the youngest of the bunch. The others were too busy staring at Aya, who had his usual glare gracing his face.   
  
"This next mission," Manx went on, as if the eight men surrounding her didn't look as if they were about to kill each other. "Requires both teams."   
  
"Why."   
  
The redheaded woman turned to the redheaded man.   
  
"Because. Sit down, all of you, and watch this. And no killing each other when the lights go out."   
  
The members of Crashers glanced at each other, before sitting down on the front couch. Weiss, on the other hand, spread out, with Aya standing directly behind the 'intruders,' and the other three taking up places that guaranteed an easy attack, if the need arose.   
  
Manx rolled her eyes slightly at the defensiveness, before starting the Kritiker video.   
  
After a series of photos of children flashed on the screen, the slideshow stopped on a dark photo of a vague shape holding something up.   
  
"Gentlemen, there is a crisis on the streets and in the home of millions. Many children have been disappearing from the streets of Tokyo, some straight from under their parents' noses, and no one can find the kidnapper. Kritiker agents have, however, gotten one picture of this elusive person."   
  
Yoji sighed in irritation as the new Persia continued on, talking about team-work and commitment to the cause. Basically, he was saying that if they didn't accept the mission, and the others' help, they would be dead.   
  
Manx shut the tv off and signaled Omi to turn the lights on.   
  
"Well. He didn't say why there are to be two teams, and I think I'll hold off on that until we get a head count on who's going."   
  
There was a slight pause in everybody's breathing, as they all waited for someone to start.   
  
"You mean they get a choice?" the oldest looking member of Crashers asked. "What kind of shit is that?"[1]   
  
"It's none of your business, that's what kind of shit it is!" Yoji retorted. "Manx, why the hell do we need them?"   
  
The woman raised an eyebrow.   
  
"You are all here because all of your qualifications are needed. Who's in?"   
  
There was more silence, then Omi raised a hand. "I'll do it. Whatever it is."   
  
The man with glasses, from Crashers, also raised his hand. "I'm in."   
  
"Me, too," Ken, and the youngest of Crashers said at the same time.   
  
Yoji snorted. "I'll go."   
  
"Why the hell not?" the other blond man said.   
  
Aya and *his* blond, however, just stared at each other.   
  
"Aya-kun?" Omi asked softly, after several minutes of the tense silence.   
  
Aya grunted. "Fine."   
  
His opponent smirked, then turned to Manx. "Count me in."   
  
Manx grimaced. "Well, the first thing you need to do is get along with each other. It won't be easy, but that's life. You'll also be splitting up, into teams of two, one Weiss, one Crasher."   
  
"Why can't we stay with our own teammates?" Yoji demanded.   
  
"Because the way you're going to do this is by Persia's rules. There is a time limit to this mission, and if it was just one group it wouldn't get done."  
  
"You saying we're incompetent?" the first blond from Crashers asked.   
  
"For this assignment? Yes." The only woman in the room held up a hand to stem the protestations. "Now that you're all in, you have to work together." She set a stack of papers on the desk, then smiled faintly.   
  
"The time schedule is on top, along with suggested teams. Any questions, beyond 'Why are we teamed up with them?'"   
  
"What happens if we don't meet the deadline?" Omi asked.   
  
There was a pause, while Manx considered her answer.   
  
"Considering how far along in the mission you'll be? ...You'll die."   
  
Aya's glaring partner broke eye contact with one redhead to connect with another.   
  
"You're sending us on a suicide mission with a team that's used to backing out on missions?"   
  
"We've never backed out on a mission!" Yoji snarled.   
  
"Yoji-kun!" Omi whispered sharply.   
  
"Yeah," the dirty blond mocked. "Better rein in, *Yoji-kun.*"   
  
"Masato!" came a sharp voice. It was the man with glasses. "Leave off."   
  
Manx smiled, more broadly this time. "I'm leaving. And because I know that you're both competent teams, even when split up, I plan on seeing eight people before the deadline."   
  
Glancing over them one more time, she turned on her heel and climbed up the basement steps.   
  
The two groups were silent until they heard the front door of the shop open and close.   
  
"This is shit."   
  
"Masato!" came three voices.   
  
Omi ignored the large group of young men glaring at each other and walked over to the papers Manx had left behind. Separating it into two groups, he picked up one and handed it to the nearest-- and youngest-- Crasher, who accepted them with a smile.   
  
Omi passed out the papers to his own team before flipping through the mission statement.   
  
"This is ridiculous," Ken finally said, after silence had dominated the room for little more than a minute, while the occupants read the mission statement.   
  
"I'll say," said Aya's blond. "Which on of you is Ken?"   
  
"They want me to team up with *you*?" Yoji and Rook exclaimed in unison.   
  
"I believe we know each other, Aya," the Crashers man wearing glasses said, a faint smile hovering over his lips.   
  
"Yes," Aya agreed.   
  
"I guess that leave us," Omi smiled, and the youngest Crasher smiled in return.   
  
"Abyssinian," came Aya's blond's-- Yuuishi's-- voice. "How cute."   
  
"Shut it, Knight," Aya retorted.   
  
"Why? We're all friends here. You can call me by my first name....Aya."   
  
"I'd rather not."   
  
Omi eyed both glaring men. "Now we know why they weren't teamed up," he muttered to himself.   
  
"We should get to work," said the man with glasses: Reiichi. "If we we want to make this deadline."   
  
Aya nodded sharply, followed by the rest of Weiss, and Naru, Omi's partner.   
  
'We'll be leaving, then," Knight announced. "Call us when you find something."   
  
"Yeah, we'll be sure to find something at four in the morning," Yoji murmured.   
  
"You're staying?" Ken asked.   
  
"Entirely beside the point," was the retort.   
  
"I'm sure," Ken grinned.   
  
"You're welcome to come with me," Yoji offered. "I'm going to drink, though, nothing else."   
  
Ken shook his head. "I might go watch the news. Maybe there's something new about the case."   
  
Omi nodded his head distractedly, as he and the two Crashers left continued to analyze and make notes on the mission.   
  
Yoji rolled his eyes, then waved a slight goodbye to Ken and Aya, who gave varying degrees of diverted goodbyes.   
  
There was a brief lull in the conversation, then a loud cracking noise filled the air. Ken separated his hands with a grin.   
  
"Shall we start?"   
  
***   
The clock was ticking. That wasn't to say it didn't usually tick, but when one paid attention to it, one noticed it had this way of skipping every third 'tick,' so if one wasn't careful, one would fall into a waiting pattern, tensing each time the clock skipped.   
  
"That's it!" Ken swore, disrupting the silence, and the odd ticking. He had started watching the news with a fervor, anxious to help. Until he had actually *watched* the news. That was when the clock had gotten louder.   
  
Opening the basement door, he shouted down the stairs, "I'm done! I'm gonna go to bed now!"   
  
He closed the door before anybody below could say anything. He really didn't feel like encountering Aya's mission face as he delivered what had-- or in fact, hadn't-- happened on the news.   
  
Ken grimaced. There were reasons he usually only watched sports; everything else was usually incredibly stupid, or incredibly boring. It wasn't that sports didn't have its stupid or dull parts, they were just, in his mind, fewer than the rest of the programs on television.   
  
Toeing off his shoes, and stripping to his boxers, Ken flicked the light switch off and collapsed on his bed.   
  
***   
Tanuma Masato groaned when his pager went off. He had been having a pleasant dream, though he knew he would never remember it.   
  
Staring blearily at the number, he frowned, not recognizing it. He was just about to throw the pager at the wall, when Yuuishi stuck his head through the the door.   
  
"Don't throw it, it's Weiss. Let's go."   
  
"What time is it?" Masato growled.   
  
"Four a.m. Let's go."   
  
***   
By the time the Crashers duo got to the store, even Yoji was there, squinting into the soft glow emanating from the light bulb, sitting next to a sleeping-sitting-up Ken.   
  
"You had to do it now, didn't you?" Yuuishi growled, and Naru snickered.   
  
"You said to page you if we found something."   
  
"And, boy, did we!" Omi exclaimed.   
  
Masato stared at the young man for a moment. "You're on crack, aren't you?"   
  
"No, I don't take drugs," Omi frowned.   
  
"You missed the point, Omittchi," Yoji snorted.   
  
"Tell them what you found," Reiichi said softly. "Before they jump us."   
  
"It's a legend," Omi started. "Around every fifty years, several children disappear in the Okada mountain area. Usually more than six vanish, but never more than thirty."   
  
"And always around the same time. The disappearances are always spread out over a one week period," Naru added.   
  
"Right," Omi agreed. "Legend's said that hundreds of years ago, a husband and wife lost their children in an accident involving demoncraft, and to further their chances of reuniting with their children, they sold their souls for eternal life and youth, so that they could search for their children's reincarnated souls.   
  
"Before, the taken children were returned unharmed, with no memory of having disappeared, but as we all saw, someone is killing them off, and in the last week, all of the twenty already kidnapped children have ended up dead."   
  
There was a pause, and then, "You're serious, aren't you?"   
  
Omi, Reiichi and Naru all nodded at Yoji, who was vainly trying to stay awake and concentrate on the new information, all at once. Ken had given up entirely, and was slumped on his side.   
  
"You woke us up to talk about vampires, reincarnation and the selling of souls?" Masato demanded. "And you let them do that, Bishop?"   
  
"Not exactly vampires, but close enough. Besides that, it is a very plausible legend. Would you deny that, after everything you've seen?" the leader of Crashers inquired, and Rook flushed.   
  
"So what do we do, now?" Yuuishi asked, leaning against the stair railing.   
  
Aya answered that one. "We hunt." 

***   
The dust was going to be the death of him, Aya decided, as he fought back yet another sneezing fit. He stared at the pile of books in front of him, then barely glanced at the bigger stack behind him. His search was definitely not going well.   
  
He'd only found one book, out of forty, that even hinted at what he was looking for, and he was well into the 1800's.   
  
He mentally cursed Bishop for choosing magazines and newspapers, not realizing, as he'd agreed to the others suggestion, that books had been around far longer than the more recent media of newspapers and magazines.   
  
A noise at the door made Aya spin, a book in hand, as if the reading material would make an adequate weapon.   
  
"Sorry to startle you," Reiichi told him. "I skimmed through everything, and got this."   
  
He held up a fair sized stack of papers. "Did you find anything?"   
  
Aya nodded shortly, and picked up the one useful book in the whole room.   
  
"I haven't gotten to the legends and fairy tales yet, either. I'll probably find more then."   
  
Reiichi nodded.   
  
"Need help, Ran?"   
  
The redhead paused, then nodded slightly.   
  
"Okay."   
  
***   
"How did you talk me into this?!"   
  
Ken tipped his head to the side, then asked, "What?"   
  
Shuuichi rolled his eyes and leaned closer to the man driving the motorcycle.   
  
"Why couldn't we have taken my car?" the blond man asked.   
  
"Too slow!" was the reply, and Shuuichi had to admit that the bike was going places his car wouldn't have made it through, legally.   
  
Yuuishi knew that they had reason to hurry. Pawn and Bombay had spotted a woman sobbing over her recently discovered missing child, setting alarms off through every Kritiker agent on duty.   
  
At the entrance to the mall, Ken screeched to a halt.   
  
"I'll go park," he said. "You find the others."   
  
Shuuichi nodded, barely making it off the bike before it was off, peeling away from the curb.   
  
***   
Ken felt nervous, though he wasn't sure why. He knew the others could take care of themselves. you didn't get very far in Kritiker without being able to look after yourself, no matter how many friends you had. And yet, with the two Crashers to help Omi, Ken couldn't hurry fast enough.   
  
Which was why he almost missed both Omi and Naru climb into a strange car, followed by two children and an older looking man.   
  
Ducking behind an SUV, Ken watched the new looking car start, then begin to back up.   
  
Racing for his bike, Ken jumped on the vehicle and started it up, just managing to get his helmet on before the car passed him. Reaching for his headphone, the brunette groaned as he realized that Knight had both earpieces. Following the strange car slowly, Ken checked the tracer in his jacket, making sure it was sewn in tightly. If worse came to worse they could just follow his signal.   
  
As the car entered the freeway, Ken automatically dropped three cars behind his target, ducking out from behind the truck he was following every now and then to check on the target.   
  
***   
Meanwhile, Weiss and Crashers were having a difficult time comprehending why three of their teammates were missing. Only Yoji, however was voicing his opinions. Loudly.   
  
"How did you manage to lose him?" Yoji snarled at Yuuishi for the umpteenth time.   
  
"I came to meet you," Yuuishi replied calmly; he was getting used to Yoji's anger.   
  
"He's your partner, and you lost him?"   
  
Masato rolled his eyes; worry was one thing, this was bordering on obsession.   
  
"One might take your worry as something more," Yuuishi smiled. "Is it?"   
  
"Knight!" Reiichi scolded, as Yoji launched himself at the other blond man, only to be held back by two pairs of strong arms.   
  
"You son of a bitch! He's a teammate! And my friend!"   
  
Aya, one of the two men holding Yoji back, released a hand to place it on the taller man's shoulder, proving that he, too, was worried.   
  
"We'll find him. We'll find *them.* Now shut up! You're attracting attention."   
  
The energy seemed to drain from Yoji's body, and he wilted into the two men holding him back, who now had the daunting task of holding him up.   
  
"Fine," Yoji said. "That still doesn't tell us where Naru and Omi went."   
  
"Use your head, *detective,*" Yuuishi sneered. "Your partner probably followed them."   
  
Masato frowned. "That's a pretty broad guess, Yuu."   
  
"We'll find them, wherever they went," Reiichi said quickly, and Yoji straightened up, brushing off the arms still prepared to hold him back.   
  
"We'll give them five more minutes, as always," Aya told the others, eyes on the agitated Yoji, who raised his eyes to meet those of his field leader's, before nodding shortly.   
  
"Five minutes," he agreed.   
  
***   
"Shit!"   
  
Ken brushed away another branch, as he stumbled over a root. The bushes and branches and brambles of the forest were clingy, refusing to let go of his jacket, snagging on his jeans and shoes. He had lost the targets-- and his teammates-- in the maze of trees as soon as they had gotten out of his direct line of sight, vanishing into the forest.   
  
Following a possible trail, Ken made a mental note to take tracking lessons. Pushing aside more bushes, Ken stopped dead in his own tracks, floored by the monstrous house that had been hidden by the large trees that surrounded it.   
  
"Hello, there."   
  
Ken turned swiftly, bugnuks out, poised and ready to strike.   
  
The speaker was a man, standing solidly and *much* bigger than Ken himself. A massive hand reached up and caught Ken's flying fist, squeezing, while the other hand clamped down on Ken's neck, sending the young man into unconsciousness.   
  
***   
"He'll be all right."   
  
"He will. That boy can take care of himself. So can Pawn, and I'll bet Bombay's fine, too."   
  
"Turn left here. Look, talk, or something."   
  
Yoji glanced away from the road for a brief second, to meet Masato's eyes. "Or something."   
  
There was more silence, and Reiichi met Masato's eyes in the rear-view mirror. Their driver was severely distracted.   
  
"I know they'll be fine," Yoji continued. "We separate all the time. It's just, Siberian doesn't even have his headset. And Bombay hasn't checked in. He *always* checks in."   
  
Masato opened his mouth to say what was on his mind, then snapped it closed. Telling his temporary teammate that maybe they *couldn't* check in wouldn't do anybody any good.   
  
At the edge of the woods, a national forest under protection of the country, Yoji stopped, as directed. Behind them, Aya's Porsche screeched to a halt, spewing dirt in a fine arc. Yuuishi jumped out immediately, slamming the door behind him.   
  
"Somebody else is riding with him on the way back," the man snarled. "I don't care who."   
  
Masato ignored the angry man and turned to Reiichi. "Do both signals go into the woods?"   
  
Reiichi nodded. "Siberian and Bombay, probably with Pawn, all in the same spot."   
  
Glancing over his leader's shoulder, to watch the faint beeping of the tracer, Masato shook his head.   
  
"Actually, they're about a hundred feet apart," he said blandly, earning a Look from Reiichi.   
  
"Shall we?" Yoji asked, zipping up his coat.   
  
"Yeah, let's go kick some vampire ass!" Masato exclaimed.   
  
"For the twentieth time, Rook," Reiichi corrected. "They're not really vampumph!"   
  
Smiling gamely, Masato walked over to Yuuishi, now scarfless.   
  
"Let's go," Yoji said. "We're just wasting time."   
  
"You *are* an impatient one, aren't you?" Yuuishi grinned, and Yoji pursed his lips, flipping the other man off.   
  
"Stop it," Aya commanded. "We follow the tracers."   
  
"Of course, Abyssinian," Reiichi said, glaring at Yoji and Yuuishi, both who barely managed to look sheepish.   
  
The group slowly made their way forward, trying to find traces of their friends in the surrounding forest, eyeing the tracks Ken had made earlier. When they found Ken's motorcycle, parked almost next to a shiny new car, that seemed to almost melt into the background, they moved faster, heading straight for the low signal of Ken and Omi's tracer bugs, until--   
  
"Holy shit!"   
  
--they reached the same house Ken had stumbled across, barely an hour earlier.   
  
"I'll have to agree with Rook," Yuuishi said. "That is one big house, especially in the middle of a national forest."   
  
"A protected, nobody's-supposed-to-walk-in-here-let-alone-live-here-national-forest," Yoji said.   
  
"Which means that not only do these guys have our teammates, they're defaming a national monument, as well," Reiichi grimaced.   
  
Aya glanced at both the tracking device, and the map of the area they had procured earlier.   
  
"This isn't right," he said. "These coordinates say that we're in--" He turned the map over, to glance at the world. "--Europe. More specifically, France."   
  
"You're saying we're in a different country?" Masato asked Aya, who glared. The others tone held something like doubt.   
  
Reiichi frowned at Masato, who closed his mouth with a snap, then turned to Aya. "Is there a possibility it might be a space warp?"   
  
Yoji stared at his teammates. "A space warp?!" he demanded, his voice going up an octave in disbelief.   
  
"It might be," Aya nodded, ignoring his Weiss teammate.   
  
"Space warp?" Yoji asked again, waving both arms wildly, in a bid for attention, finally attaining it in an arched crimson brow.   
  
Masato snickered at the younger blond. "Crashers mission, a few years ago."   
  
Aya finally took pity on Yoji's still-confused expression, and gave him a bit more of an explanation.   
  
"I was thrown into ancient Russia, on a mission."   
  
Yoji blinked at his teammate. "Oh, is that all," he sneered. "Well, gee, I'm all for your idea that a part of the French countryside is residing in a national forest in Japan, all on the basis of you visiting the Siberian ice-age a few years ago!"   
  
Several brows were raised by the time he was finished, and Yoji glared, making a slight move with his hand that they all recognized in one form or another as the 'I-need-a-cigarette-dammit-where-are-they?' motion.   
  
With an unhappy hitch in his breath, Yoji finally sighed and stared at his teammates.   
"What do we do now?"   
  
Reiichi raised a hand slightly, to get their attention, then said, "Shall we camp and wait to siege, or do we rampage?"   
  
There was a brief moment of quiet, before the other four men said in unison: "Rampage."   
  
***   
Time crept slowly. Very slowly. Every time Yoji glanced at his watch, it held the same time. He ducked under a beam, cursing his luck of the draw.   
  
The others had, through process of elimination, given him the job of scouting ahead, while they set up haphazard bombs made from the materials in the combined vehicles they had driven, including Ken's bike, and the strange car.   
  
None of the explosives were as good as if Omi or Naru had been there, but they would suffice for the job they were needed to do.   
  
Yoji exhaled slowly, wishing for a cigarette, or something as equally soothing, as he bypassed another rafter, in his quest to not hit his head while he stuck small lights to the rafters. They were actually jerry-rigged extra car lights, found in Aya's Porsche, but they worked just as well as any flashlight, of which they only had three of.   
  
He glanced yet again at he machine steadily beeping at his hip, noting that the tracers of his youngest team members still hadn't moved.   
  
Which could have been good or bad, depending on the situation.   
  
His headset crackled, and Yoji stopped moving. He'd already learned once that when he talked and crept through strange rafters, he fell more easily than if he'd been paying strict attention to where he placed his feet.   
  
"Where are you, Balinese?" came Aya's voice.   
  
"Not where I'm supposed to be," Yoji muttered to himself, then pressed the 'talk' button. "I'm almost there, Abyssinian. It's slow going because of the unfamiliarity, and the fact that I can't see the rooms I'm above, but I'm getting there."   
  
The headset crackled again, but this time, Reiichi's voice came through. "We're done with the explosives. Will you be there and ready when we follow your trail?"   
  
Yoji nodded affirmative, wincing when his head hit a beam. "I'll be ready."   
  
"Good. Bishop out."   
  
With half his mind still on the direction he was supposed to go, and the other half trying not to get him killed by placing his feet in secure positions, Yoji didn't actually see the wall until he ran into it.   
  
"Shit!" he whispered harshly. "Just peachy." Looking at the tracker unit, he cursed again. The room Naru and Omi were in was on the other side of the wall. Back-tracking slightly, the blond turned on a flashlight, using it to sweep over the floor, to try and find an access door. Passing all over the floor space, he finally found a small handle in the floor, that when pulled, revealed a fair sized hole. Moving so that he had good view of the room below, Yoji's brow wrinkled when he saw an elegant looking middle-aged woman sitting on a dais on the far side of the room.   
  
She seemed impatient, and every time she fidgeted with her dress, Yoji had to blink and re-focus his eyes, not sure of what he was seeing. Was she *glowing*?   
  
The assassin flinched when the large doors at the end of the hallway hit the walls, revealing a very large man. The woman on the dais smiled broadly, then blinked and frowned at whatever was behind the man.   
  
Two creatures-- for Yoji had no other word for them-- were wheeling in a table. Strapped to the table was Ken, his head lolled to the side.   
  
"Yoshi!"   
  
The woman's voice was low-pitched, but it carried far, and the broad man bowed.   
  
"He came here, my love. I thought it might have been one of ours."   
  
"But he's too old!" the woman exclaimed. "And did you feel anything for him?"   
  
The man shook his head, then raised a hand. "I did, however, feel something for one of today's."   
  
Yoji froze as the woman walked towards Ken, a hand held out.   
  
"Do you think it's one of ours?" came Reiichi's voice, and Yoji gasped.   
  
"I hope not," he finally responded, turning slightly to stare at his other teammates. "Kids're screwed up as it is."   
  
Running a hand over his forehead, the woman shook her head. "He is not right," she announced, heading back to her chair.   
  
Below them, Yoshi waved his right hand forward, and two more of the servant-creatures entered the hall, herding children....including Omi and Naru.   
  
Yoji let out a low hiss as his teammates walked placidly, allowing themselves to be lined up with the much younger group of eight children.   
  
The creatures, with another wave of Yoshi's hand, began to convey the children, one at a time, to the woman, who held a hand out and touched each child's forehead.   
  
By the time Naru and Omi were brought to her, she was sweating faintly, and tears were running down her face.   
  
Yoji could feel the tension behind him, and he prayed that his teammates weren't right for the woman, whatever she was looking for.   
  
With a final touch to their faces, the woman waved the two boys away.   
  
"They're none of them right," the woman told Yoshi, who had a mixed look of anger and sadness warring on his face. "We'll never find them!"   
  
She fell into Yoshi's arms, sobbing openly.   
  
"Now, Isa, you know we haven't been searching for that long. We'll find them," the big man soothed.   
  
With another sob, she ran from the room.   
  
Yoshi grimaced, but stayed where he was. His face lost any caring emotion he'd shown at all as he turned towards his servants.   
  
He motioned at the children. "Corner them."   
  
The four creatures sprang into action, pulling the dazed children towards the far wall, setting up a loose half-circle around them.   
  
Up in the rafters, Yoji blanched. The knife Yoshi had pulled from his belt looked as dangerous as it was ornamental....and was it ever ornamental.   
  
"We shall start the blood rights here, now," Yoshi intoned. "Starting with this trespasser." The giant man started for Ken.   
  
"I say we go now," Yuuishi said.   
  
Yoji seconded that by pressing the button on the side of his watch, aiming for a beam above his head. He felt the end of the wire wrap around something, and he jumped   
  
"Hey!" he cried, as he sailed towards the ground, happy that while the house was several stories high, each level was no more than fifteen feet tall.   
  
Yoji landed in a roll, still letting wire loose, feeling the tug of his other teammates following on the light string.   
  
As he bounded to his feet, Yoji ignored the scattering children, instead heading straight for Ken. As he avoided the creatures, who were actually flocking towards Yoshi, Yoji saw Reiichi and Masato follow after the children, with Reiichi using a tranquilizer on the children they caught.   
  
Unstrapping Ken, Yoji ducked a creature that flew over his head, courtesy of Yuuishi. He heard Aya yell something, and then the unmistakable sound of metal on metal rang out.   
  
"C'mon, Ken," Yoji muttered, nudging his teammate. "You gotta wake up enough for me to help you out."   
  
Ken, his eyes dilated widely, just blinked slowly at his teammate, and Yoji snarled quietly. Ducking his head under the brunette's arm, Yoji hefted Ken's body half off the table. With a grunt, the other assassin's legs began to head for the ground.   
  
"Balinese, to your right!" came Masato's voice, and Yoji half-turned, kicking out with his foot at the creature that was headed for him.   
  
There was a loud twang! and the creature shrieked, turning away from Yoji and Ken, to Omi, who was drawing back his bow for another shot.   
  
Yoji yelped a thank you as he ducked fully under Ken, lifting the younger man onto his shoulders, stumbling under the dead weight. The blond assassin eyed the doorways at both ends of the hallway and frowned; they were both too far away to reach in any record time.   
  
Frowning back and forth at the end doors, Yoji shifted Ken slightly. He may have been a thin soccer player, but he was a *muscled* soccer player, and dead weight, to boot.   
  
"Balinese!" he heard Reiichi yell. "To me!"   
  
Yoji glanced around, his eyes finally lighting on the older man, who had three children in his arms. With a quick glance at his other four teammates, Yoji sprinted towards the door.   
  
He passed Reiichi with a brief nod, hearing the other man's footsteps echoing behind him as he ran.   
  
Ahead of him was the door out, and he kicked it open, happy the others had thought to rig it on their way in.   
  
***   
"You think you can defeat me?" Yoshi demanded of Aya, who was glaring as frostily as he could, sword out in a defiant gesture. "I am older and wiser than you. When your *grandparents* weren't even in this world, I was defeating things with more stature than you! You are *nothing* to me."   
  
"So why haven't you killed him, yet?" came Yuuishi's voice. His own blade drawn, the blond smiled. "Tell you what. You can try to kill us both."   
  
***   
Yoji put Ken down by the first tree he came to, and turned in one smooth movement, taking one of Reiichi's children. Omi and Naru came out, each dragging a child, and Masato practically dropped his three children in his hurry to grab the paper bag he'd hidden at the base of the tree before they'd infiltrated the mansion.   
  
"I'm going back in," he announced, and three of them nodded; Yoji wasn't paying attention.   
  
As Masato left, Reiichi extracted his cell phone from a pocket, and swiftly dialed a number. He watched Omi and Naru check the pulses of the children they had rescued, and Yoji fuss over Ken, as the phone rang once... twice... thr--   
  
"Well?" came a feminine voice that announced that that if you pissed her off, you'd be sorry.   
  
"Almost done," he responded. "Hatchlings safe, vultures being eradicated."   
  
"Good. We have your position."   
  
A dial-tone, and Reiichi hung up. "They're coming," he announced.   
  
"Great," Yoji sighed.   
  
***   
Masato knew it should have been difficult to find the opponents he had left earlier, from the assumption that it had taken him nearly an hour to find the center room in the first place, but he realized as soon as he entered the mansion that all he had to do was follow the sounds of battle echoing down the hallway.   
  
***   
Omi heard it first; a low, melodic, almost remorseful sounding tune.   
  
***   
After a wrong turn that took him into a kitchen, long disused, Masato found the three combatants, surrounded by more creatures than the original four servants, and a large pool of blood that was making their boots stick to the floor.   
  
"Oi!" the blond man screamed, causing both humans and the ancient spirit to start out of their battle-haze.   
  
Masato drew both objects from his paper bag, throwing one directly at the spirit-turned-flesh.   
  
The clear liquid from the water balloon splashed the older man's chest, running down his clothing in rivulets.   
  
The man stared down at his dripping clothing, then back up at Masato, who had the second object from the bag behind his back.   
  
"Is this supposed to stop me?" the ancient man asked. "Holy water?" A great booming laughter filled the hall, while the humans glanced at each other.   
  
***   
All who were conscious looked up to the roof, where the source of the sound was coming from. A shadow detached itself from the darkness, revealing itself to be the woman, from earlier. She continued to play her fiddle, ignoring the gaping spectators below.   
  
***   
Masato sneered, lighting the flare he'd kept hidden. "Don't you know what gasoline smells like?" he asked, throwing the flame at the still-laughing ancient.   
  
The small flame leapt for the gas, igniting the burning liquid, eating at the clothing and flesh underneath.   
  
Aya and Yuuishi pulled out their own distinct weapons, two specially carved stakes, and with the redhead from behind and the blond in front, they attacked, neatly avoiding the flailing hands and burning body of the child-killer, as they speared his heart from two different directions.   
  
As he thrashed about, Yoshi managed to catch Yuuishi's arm, holding on tightly.   
  
***   
"He did it for me," the woman on the roof said, and Omi sighed in unhappiness when Reiichi signaled for him to use his arrows. "He never really loved the children." A tear slid down her cheek as Omi set up his crossbow. "He did it for me!"   
  
***   
Yuuishi fell jerked back with a soft cry, holding his left arm close to his side. Aya, with a loud yell, leapt forward, sword out, slashing at the burning man's neck, severing many tendons in the effort to behead his enemy. With another chop and a swift jerk, the head fell completely away from the body, landing at the feet of a staring Yuuishi.   
  
"Let's go!" Masato commanded. "Knight! Abyssinian! Move!" He hit the demolition's switch Naru had rigged, and he had planted, up. The house started to rumble as the trio ran from the battleground, avoiding chunks of wall that fell at them, as if the very house was trying to take them with it.   
  
***   
As Omi sighted down his weapon, the woman turned to fully face him.   
  
"I truly did love them," she whispered, as Omi pulled the trigger.   
  
***   
Ken opened his eyes to Yoji's chin. Blinking in confusion, he wiggled a little, realizing his head was in the lap of the other.   
  
Yoji looked down swiftly, and smiled faintly at Ken, who winced.   
  
"Where am I?" he asked.   
  
"You, boy, are in front of a burning mansion," Yoji responded. "And not just any burning mansion, but one that manages to be both in the middle of the National Japanese Forest, *and* France."   
  
Ken frowned. "What?"   
  
Yoji's smile became a little tenser. "Never mind. I'll tell you after you're concussion is healed."   
  
Hearing more voices beyond those of his teammate, Ken turned his head slightly, to watch a group of strangers carrying children into a big black van.   
  
Off to the side stood Crashers and Weiss, intermingled, with only Omi and Naru actually touching. Omi and Naru?   
  
Ken tried to sit up, pointing vaguely at the two young boys.   
  
"Yeah, yeah, they're fine. And when you get better, we're gonna talk about you and you're habit of not taking the headphones," was the reply.   
  
Ken glared, then sighed and closed his eyes.   
  
"Well done," came a familiar voice. Manx stepped from the gloom, her black clothing a strange look for the usually vibrant redhead. "Maybe I should have Persia team you up more often."   
  
"No!" came eight immediate voices, and Manx chuckled as even Ken managed to yell.   
  
"We'll see," she said.   
  
Yoji looked down at Ken, smiling, making the other smile back.   
  
"Can we go home?" Ken asked, and Yoji nodded.   
  
***   
"I screwed up."   
  
Yoji frowned at Ken, who was lying on his side, his blanket pulled up to his chin. "No, you didn't."   
  
"I did, too. I shouldn't have followed them. I knew about the tracers."   
  
"They're our friends," Yoji replied. "You're allowed moments of stupidity."   
  
Ken laughed, then clutched his head.   
  
Yoji rolled his eyes, shifting the blankets around his friend. "I'm gonna go. You have aspirin, a bucket in case you don't make it to the bathroom in time, water, orange juice and the remote control to your tv has been revoked. Go to sleep."   
  
"Even though you're going to wake me up in an hour?"Ken retorted, and Yoji smiled.   
  
"Yup."   
  
"Damn concussion."   
  
"Sleep."   
  
With another brief smile, Yoji closed Ken's door behind him.   
  
***   
In a far away land, that still manages to be Right There, a high lord of the realm sits.   
  
"There will be others," he says softly, watching his scrying mirror. "Many more."   
  
  
**END**   
  
  
[1] This is on the assumption that Crashers is just given assignments, with no room to back out. 


End file.
